I don't think that people are realizing that of the supposed "most wanted" who were rounded up afterwards, many of these were street involved and/or downtown located youth and/or youth of colour, most of whom had probably been targeted by police in the past and who were therefore easily recognizable to them on sight.
I'm certain that many of these young men, who seem to have effectively fallen between the cracks due to being neither "peaceful" protesters nor "conspiratorial" radical anarchist politicos, are being singled out as sacrificial straw men who are not being claimed by either type of protester.
No one writes about them.
No one fully claims them.
In fact, pretty much everyone seems to be attempting to distance from them.
They were the violent ones...so people say.
They are the ones who should be charged...so even the "peaceful" protesters seem to be saying.
They are allied with the black bloc...this particular construct is hilarious given that many of the most wanted were identified because they were not masked.
Actually, some seem to be trying to say that they ARE the black bloc and everyone knows the black bloc is evil (boooooo...). the black bloc is a liability (more scary booooo...). the black bloc is actually a nest of police agents provocateurs (definitely scary boooooo....).
So, it seems from both mainstream corporate media and lefty media, as well, that these youth are being constructed as dodgy and thoroughly untrustworthy. No matter how you slice it, this set is being tarred with a brush labeled trouble. One end links them to an almost mythic, ninja like group of alleged property destroyers. The other links them potentially to infiltrators, spies. If we are to believe all we've read and heard, this group is bad to the bone.
In any case, although a few of the people fingered by police as the worst criminal element of the protests are actually well-known community based organizers, most of these youth are not highly respected political activists. Clearly they are not people with a larger societal vision who need to be rallied behind. In fact, if all the reports and accusations are true (which is yet to be proven by the prosecution), it seems that they are completely responsible for sullying an otherwise peaceful series of protests. According to many lefty media journalists they diverted the agenda. They upset the police. They hid among innocent protesters. They caused the criminalization of dissent. And they're also the toothfairy, santa claus and yeti, too. :)
Yup.
So there's no need to include blatant mention of them in anyone's press releases.
There's no need to think about them at all.
There's no need to think about the kind of message sent to other disenfranchised and/or at risk youth who might have been interested in coming out to future protest as a way to intelligently, creatively and non-violently utilize their rage, who have now loud and clear received a message, not just courtesy of the police's dealings during and after the G20 protests but also courtesy of the left's subtle disassociation message, as well, that it just isn't safe to participate in the ways they know best.
I think that youth who are on the bottom, who are oppressed, get the message to back off or risk being lied about, being further targeted, being sold down the river, being left hung out to dry.
Best keep to the shadows, to the margins.
Better yet - just stay home.
Keep your nose clean.
Stay out of the political arena entirely.
This doesn't concern people who are not part of a group or org.
It shouldn't concern them if they don't want to get in trouble, that is.
If they don't want to have their images and full names splayed all over the covers of national newspapers.
They don't want to have perfect strangers looking at them as if they're dangerous.
Oh WAIT! That already happens.
They don't want the police coming after them and knocking at their door.
Oh WAIT! That already happens, too.
So basically, to sum it up, with very few exceptions (these exceptions being people who are well known and well liked in activist circles) the "most wanted" are nobody, nobody's children, nobody's sworn allies, nobody's problem.
No one is effectively rallying around them in an organized fashion. No one's theories about anarchism, the radical political or civil/ized protest or the criminalisation of nice, proper, neat, peaceful dissent fits their experience with the police, fits the accusations that are being leveled against them.
If anyone is going to buckle under the financial weight of defending themselves against the state, it will be these youth. If anyone is going to experience severe damage to their already fragile reputations and place in the world, it will be these youth.
Not the proper pacifist peaceful protesters with their lawsuits.
Not the politicized activists with their networks, organizations, C.V.'s, respectful references, allies and rhetoric.
These supposedly "violent", supposedly criminal, already criminalized, already marginalized youth will most likely be caught between a rock and a hard place. Most likely they will be the ones who are hung out to dry.
0 transmissions:
Post a Comment